“So that’s the next move,” said Lomas, “and if you can tell me what it means I shall be obliged to you.”
Reggie dropped his hand on the table. “Not a guess,” he said. “How can a man guess? We don’t even know how much they know, or whether one knows what the other knows. I could fancy Sandford—what’s the use?
“So runs my dream. But what am I?
An infant crying in the night,
An infant crying for the light,
And with no language but a cry.
Same like you, Lomas.”
“I notice you are not so much the moral sage this morning,” Lomas said sourly.
“Lomas, dear, don’t be unkind. I can’t abear it. I wish to God I was down there!”
“Damn it, we’ve got two men down there now—one on Sandford, one on Kimball. They’ll be knocking their heads together. What the devil do you think you could do?”
“Nothing. Lord, don’t I know it? Nothing. That’s what makes me peevish.”
Lomas said severely that he had work to do, and Reggie left him, promising to come back and take him out to lunch, which he received as if it were a threat.
But when Reggie did come back, Superintendent Bell was in the room and Lomas listening to the telephone. Bell looked oddly at Reggie. Lomas raised a blank and pallid face from the receiver. “Sandford has murdered Kimball,” he said.
“Oh, Peter! I wonder if he’s brought it off,” Reggie murmured. “Has he brought it off after all?” He bit his lip. Lomas was talking into the telephone. Asking for details, giving instructions. “Hold the line. Cut that out,” said Reggie. “We’ll go down, Lomas, please. Tell your chap to meet us at the house. My car’s here.”
Lomas gave the orders and rang off. “I’ll have to go, I suppose,” he agreed. “One doesn’t kill Cabinet Ministers every day. More’s the pity. Damn the case! There’s nothing in it, though, Fortune. Sandford was walking up to the house. He met Kimball in the lane. They were crossing the ornamental water in the park when they had a quarrel. Kimball was thrown in. He called out, ‘You scoundrel, you have murdered me.’ When they got Kimball out he was dead. That’s all. I’m afraid it washes your stuff about Kimball right out.”
“Well, well,” Reggie drawled, looking through his eyelashes. “Where is he that knows, Lomas? From the great deep to the great deep he goes, Lomas. We’ll get on.”
“What about lunch?”
“Damn lunch!” said Reggie, and went out.
The other two, who liked food far less than he but could not go without it, lingered to collect sandwiches, and found him chafing in the driver’s seat.
They exchanged looks of horror. “I’m too old for Mr. Fortune’s driving, and that’s a fact,” Bell mumbled.
“When I got out alive after that day at Woking I swore I’d never go again,” said Lomas.
But they quailed before Reggie’s virulent politeness when he asked them if they would please get in. … It is in the evidence of Lomas that they only slowed once, when an old lady dropped her handkerchief in the middle of Croydon. He is in conflict with the statement of Bell as to the most awful moment. For he selects the episode of the traction-engine with trucks at the Alwynstow crossroads, and Bell chooses the affair of the motorbus and the caravan at Merstham. They agree that they arrived at Alwynstow Park in a cold sweat.
A detective came out on the steps to meet them, and watched reverently Bell and Lomas helping each other out. Reggie ran up to him. “Which are you?”
“Beg pardon, sir? Oh, I’m Hall. I had Mr. Kimball. It was Parker had Mr. Sandford.” He turned to Lomas. “Good morning, sir. I tried to get you on the telephone, but they said you were on your way down.”
“Oh, you’ve been on the telephone too?”
“When I heard what Parker’s information was I rung up quick, sir. It’s a very queer business, sir.”
“Where is Parker? And where’s Sandford? I suppose you’ve arrested him?”
“Well, no, sir. Not strictly speaking. We detained him pending instructions.”
“Damme, you’re very careful. Parker saw the murder committed, didn’t he?”
“Well, sir, if I may say so, that’s drawing conclusions. I don’t understand Parker would go as far as that.”
“Good Gad!” said Lomas. “Where the devil is Parker?”
“Keeping Mr. Sandford under observation, sir, according to instructions. Beg your pardon, sir. I’ve heard his story, and I quite agree it all happened like that. But you haven’t heard mine.”
Lomas looked round him. The house was too near. “We’ll walk on the lawn,” he announced. “Now then. Parker says the two men quarrelled on the bridge over the lake and Kimball was thrown in, and as he fell he called out, ‘You scoundrel, you’ve murdered me!’ And you say that isn’t murder.”
“Did Serjeant Parker say ‘thrown in’?” said Hall, with surprise in his face and his voice.
“I believe he didn’t,” said Lomas slowly. “No. He said Kimball was thrown off, and as he fell in he called out.”
“That’s right, sir,” said Hall heartily. “But I reckon there is more to it than that. When Mr. Kimball came out this morning I was waiting for him in the park. It was rather touch and go, because he had some men at work above the lake. He went down that way to the station. As he was crossing the bridge he tried the rails. It’s very odd, sir, but a bit of the bar—it’s a sort of rustic stuff—was that loose it came off in his hand. He put
